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Thursday, 3 August 2017

ALBUM REVIEW: Dead Cross - "Dead Cross"

By: Charlie Butler

Album Type: Full Length

Date Released: 04/08/2017

Label: Ipecac Recordings |

Three
One G

While Dead Cross don’t quite deliver the all-out face-melting
insanity you may expect from their constituent parts, this debut is still an
exhilarating burst of queasy punk rock mayhem that reminds most young
pretenders who’s in charge.

It’s
impossible not to get excited about the talent gathered to form Dead Cross. Any new project from Mike Patton comes with high expectations, but throw in the mighty
drum skills of Dave Lombardo, The Locust’s Justin Pearson on bass and Festival Of Dead Deer’sMichael Crain unleashing six-string carnage and anticipation goes
through the roof.

What’s
most apparent on the band’s debut LP is that they sound like they are having a
total blast. Dead Cross’ blend of no-nonsense hardcore
punk, restless metal and goth-tinged weirdness may be slightly more
straightforward than the band member’s career peaks but it packs a real punch.

The
highlights of this album come when Dead Cross switch
between breathless intensity and slower sections within the space of a track. “Idiopathic” and “Obedience School” are sub-three minute epics that find the band
ripping through furious riffs and sections of reverb-assisted grandeur. This
backdrop of ever-changing sounds and moods give Patton freedom to unleash his full arsenal of vocal talents from
smooth crooning to incomprehensible gurgles and screams. Most disturbing is his
mumbled utterances of “Tampax” over
the bizarre locked groove that ends “Gag
Reflex”.

“Shillelagh” is the closest Dead Cross get to Faith No More territory
with a strong “King For A Day...”
feel to its ever-shifting punk rock churn. The second half of the album finds
the band channelling the spirit of Pearson
and Crain’s31G Records
past, particularly the off-kilter rock’n’roll discord of “The Future Has Been Cancelled”. The only slight misfire here is
their cover of Bauhaus’ “Bela Lugosi’s Dead”. They deliver a spirited version of the track
but its presence in the middle of the LP is jarring and
disrupts its breakneck flow.

While
Dead Cross don’t quite deliver the all-out face-melting
insanity you may expect from their constituent parts, this debut is still an
exhilarating burst of queasy punk rock mayhem that reminds most young
pretenders who’s in charge.

Band Submissions

To those bands who have recently issued their first demo or album via bandcamp and would like to be featured on our 666 Pack Review or considered for a full review or stream please contact Aaron via email including your EPK, band bio, album file or download code, including artwork.

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We will consider bands from any genre but exclusively stoner, sludge, doom, psych, post-metal, experimental, black-metal etc. (Whilst I would like to respond to every email, this is not always possible.) Thanks